


Kinda Toast

by joudama



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: I just starting writing this as a lark and it kept going, I kinda know what this is now, I might even know where it’s going now, M/M, even I think it’s cute, i dunno what this is, promptio
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-15
Updated: 2018-12-31
Packaged: 2019-09-18 17:29:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 3,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16999419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joudama/pseuds/joudama
Summary: It was all because of a Gelatin.Well, that, and Gladio praising him, but he was gonna blame the Gelatin.





	1. He’s Toast

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lhugy_for_short](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lhugy_for_short/gifts).



> I was playing, and a line triggered, and I knew this’d make a friend happy. XD

It was in the middle of a random, stupid fight.

They were just fighting some Gelatins. The stupidest possible monster that could actual jack you if you weren’t careful.

“Prompto! You’re up!” Noct yelled just as he dodged out of the way of a Gelatin’s truly disgusting slimy...arm-thing? Yeah, he was gonna go with “arm thing.” Arm-thing.

“All right!” Prompto yelled, and hit it with a Recoil.

That’s when it happened.

Gladio actually _praised_ him.

“You’ve come a long way, Prom,” he said, and there wasn’t anything...sarcastic or mocking in his voice. It was...serious.

It hit him like a blow to the stomach. “Thanks,” he said, feeling like he’d been hit by a Confuse as he hazarded a glance over at him. Gladio gave him a quick lopsided smile that looked almost...proud?, and Prompto’s heart went... _still_.

Then he got hit on the head by a Gelatin slimy goopy arm thing.

Felt about the same as seeing that little smile did.

“I take it back,” Gladio said, hitting the Gelatin that had just gobsmacked Prompto as hard as Gladio’s praise did. But he gave him a little smile again, and Prompto knew he was kinda toast.


	2. Still Kinda Toast

Gladio didn’t help with the “toast” thing.

“Don’t let them get you,” he said, right as one of those ridiculously jumpy Erishkigals came up out of the stupid floor the next level down in the stupid dungeon they were in and took a swipe at him.

He sounded...concerned. Like, really concerned. Not...not like he normally did, when he sounded condescending, like he didn’t think Prompto could take care himself (ok, truth was, he couldn’t. Or hadn’t been able to. But he’d been working hard. Prompto knew he was the weak link. He _knew_ it. But he had been trying. He wasn’t as strong or as tough as everyone else even now, and at the beginning, yeah, Gladio or Noct or Ignis had had to pull his dumb ass to safety more than once, but he was determined to not make them have to do that ever again). 

“Watch out for yourself,” Prompto said, giving him a grin to cover the way his stomach did that weird dropping into his knees thing and his heart decided beating the right way was just too hard. 

He really hoped it sounded normal.

Gladio just rolled his eyes then gave another one of those little smiles, right before he hit the stupid jumpy Erishkigal about to swipe at his head with his sword.

Oh, yeah.

He was complete and total _toast_.


	3. So, So Toast

They’d already picked up the headlights Cindy had wanted, but Noct insisted they go back and kill _whatever_ it was that was lurking around in the middle of the sewers that they hadn’t bothered getting the last time because it had been three AM and really, it was past his bed time and he was gonna whine about it until Noct let him get some stupid sleep.

But Noct hadn’t been able to let go of the idea that there was something else down there, besides the giant Naga giving him nightmares and flashbacks forever after that one had decided he looked like her lunch or her baby or whatever and snatched him. So back down they went.

Prompto figured the Naga was the worst that could possibly be down there. So he really wasn’t expecting a giant dragon thing, but really, that was their luck.

And of _course_ it breathed fire. Or cast fire. Anyway, fire. Coming out of it. 

“You holding up ok?” Gladio yelled at him as Prompto jumped out of the way of the dragon snake thing’s tail-body-tail-whatever. 

“I’m good!” Prompto yelled. Then realized he was not good. “OK, _no_ , not good, not ok, cover me, reloading!” he yelled in a slight panic.

“I gotcha!” Gladio yelled back, and out of nowhere, the guy just...jumped in and got right in between Prompto and the giant dragon snake and used his shield to block it trying to eat Prompto’s head as he tried to reload his stupid gun that had chosen the absolute worst time to run out of stupid bullets.

He was trying to jam bullets in his stupid gun, and that actually required concentration because dropping them would be really bad, but...

Man, how had he never noticed just how _big_ Gladio was? Prompto wasn’t blind; Gladio was a good head taller than all of them and as big as all three of the rest of them put together, but you really _noticed_ that when he was shielding your stupid ass from a giant, fire-breathing dragon snake and not even breaking a sweat and you were huddling not just under his shield but the man himself.

__

__

It really wasn’t helpful that his heart and stomach were both doing that _thing_ again. That dropping into his knees and not beating right thing.

It also wasn’t helping that Gladio was making these little grunts from the force of holding back the giant fire-breathing snake dragon thing, and...and they were...they were kinda...and he was so _close_ , and...

...oh, fuck, he was so toast.

“Thanks, man!” he said, really hoping his voice didn’t crack as he slammed the last bullets into place.

“No problem,” Gladio said, and gave him that little _smile._

His heart went thump again, despite the giant dragon snake thing breathing fire at him, and toast. He was so, _so_ totally toast.


	4. Picture Time!

“Oh! Oh! It’s the original Kenny Crow! Can we get a picture, Noct? We can get a picture of Kenny Crow taking you under his wing!”

“If it’ll make you happy,” Noct said, sounding less than happy himself, but resolved to indulging whatever it was Prompto asked of him.

“It would give me a mouthful of happiness!” Prompto let out with glee at the thought of the shot.

...Gladio choked and then let out the strangest coughing fit he’d ever heard.

He looked back, and Gladio was bright red and beating his chest with his fist, and Noct was smirking.

“...what?” Prompto said, feeling completely confused. “Did I say something weird?”

“No weirder than normal,” Ignis said, smoothly turning the car around and going back to the Crow’s Nest. “But we do know we have two perverts in the backseat.”

There was a beat of silence.

Then another.

Then.

“...I don’t get it,” Prompto said, feeling more lost.

“Never mind. Let’s just get your picture,” Ignis said, a tiny smile tugging at the corner of his lips.

Gladio was staring almost forcefully out at the scenery and NOT looking at him, and Noct was still smirking.

...what had he said that was so...?

Whatever, there was a picture to take, and it was picture time!

Still. There was something about the tinge of pink still on Gladio’s cheeks that made him feel kinda...

 _Picture_. Picture time. Yeah. Pictures.

Pictures.

...yeah.


	5. Chocobo Butt is Toast

They were on their way to some fishing spot, because Noct decided he needed to get his fishing on. Given the type of days they’d been having - namely fighting Nagas and giant snake dragon things on fire in the sewers - Prompto really couldn’t blame the guy for wanting to just chill out and... _not_ for a couple hours.

So of course, they ran into a swarm of Hundlegs.

“Nope!” Noct yelled, and didn’t even slow down his chocobo. In fact, he did the opposite, and spurred her sides to make her run faster. 

His chocobo did a little hop, and took off at top speed for outside of the Hundlegs’ territory.

“Agreed!” Ignis hollered back, and set his chocobo off after Noct, nimbly avoding the too-many-legged thing trying to take a swing at his chocobo.

Gladio looked over at Prompto and gave him that little _look_ he was good at. That little “amused but not gonna show it” look. 

That look that made Prompto’s stomach feel like it was was trying to warp-jump into his knees or his throat or somewhere it wasn’t supposed to be. But in a good kinda way, and yeah. Still very much toast because NO NO NO, he could not _possibly_ be getting a crush on his best friend’s _bodyguard_ and who could _step_ on him and this was gonna make everything _weird_ and....

“Well?”

“Yeah, I’m with them. These are not the type of bad guys I like to fight,” Prompto said, and spurred his chocobo past the giant centipede things and after Noct’s rapidly-disappearing-from-sight chocobo.

“Hi-yup!” Gladio yelled to his chocobo, and the chocobo put on a burst up speed, bringing them right up close to Prompto and nope nope _nope_ , that was not helping with the Prom Being Toast thing. “And what kind of bad guys _do_ you like to fight?” Gladio asked, sounded genuinely interested.

Prompto blinked, then, “...none, now that you mention it!” he said cheerfully, and Gladio gave a little snort of laughter.

His stomach did the warp-jump thing again, and he ducked his head against his chocobo’s neck and clicked for her to jump. “Gonna get left behind, slowpoke!” he yelled, and tried to outrace his own far too quickly beating heart.

There was just no _way_ this could end well.

“Not a chance, Prom,” Gladio yelled over at him. “You’re gonna be eating my dust,” he finished, then let out a laugh of pure, unexpected _joy_ as his chocobo suddenly shot past Prompto faster than he’d ever gone before, the chocobo looking like he was glad to finally have the chance to let loose. 

Gladio looked back, a rare grin on his face and his eyes lighting up as he laughed, like he was enjoying letting loose just as much as his chocobo was. “Eat it, chocobo butt!” 

He leaned in, and Gladio and his chocobo took off again like a bolt, Gladio letting out a whoop of glee as they caught up with and passed Noct and Ignis.

...Oh, yeah, he was _definitely_ toast.


	6. Gone Fishin’

Noct was in his own little contented world getting his fishing on, but the sun was going down, and Prompto was starting to get...twitchy.

He didn’t like being out when the sun went down. No one did, but...well...he really didn’t like it. He’d grown up knowing just how unsafe it was at night outside the city, and he still remembered the sheer terror at seeing an actual daemon for the first time.

Maybe growing up learning how to fight and about how to take down all the dangers that roamed around at night were why no one else seemed as DANGER DANGER DANGER as him about when the sun went down. Gladio and Ignis would mention it, but none of them seemed to get as nervous about it as he did. Maybe they’d never heard all the fairy tales about kids getting eaten by daemons or something.

“Kinda getting dark, Noct,” Prompto finally said, when it seemed like no one else was gonna say it.

“Huh? Oh,” Noctis said, blinking. “Huh. Guess it is. Gimme a couple more minutes. Something’s about to bite.”

“Uh, ok,” he said, knowing that “about to bite” could mean thirty seconds or two hours and Noct would consider them about the same.

He could hear Gladio snort from where he was helping Ignis clean and gut the fish Noct had caught earlier. Prompto had been helping as well, but he was mostly relegated to “dumping scales and fish guts.” Noct would catch a fish or two, Gladio or Ignis would scale and clean it, and then Prompto would wander off downstream to throw the guts and scales away while Ignis filleted or did whatever he did to cut the fish into food.

That was part of why Prompto was getting so twitchy; he knew he smelled like blood, and he’d been dumping the unwanted fish bits far away from them so it wouldn’t attract anything over looking for an easy meal. Prompto hated sitting still, so it was the perfect job for him - find a place far from them and where Noct was fishing, dump the fish bits, and come back. And it was fine, until sunset. Then he became more aware of how much he smelled like fish blood and how monsters got a lot more aggressive as it got darker.

The sun was definitely going down now, and the red frogs were starting to croak.

“There’s a campsite nearby,” Gladio said, tilting his head in the direction of a faint glow coming from downstream, near where Prompto had been dumping the unwanted fish bits; the sure sign of a warded area that would be safe. He stood up and walked the few steps over to the river, and squatted down to rinse the fish gross off his hands, then stood back up and looked over at Prompto. “After Noct’s ‘about to bite’ turns into an actual bite and Ignis cleans it, we dump the fish guts, go get the gear from the Regalia, then start setting up camp.”

Relief flooded through him at the thought of both not having to wander in the dark alone and at camp, and he grinned at Gladio.

“I like that plan. Let’s do that plan,” he said, nodded.

Gladio gave him a little half smile, Prompto’s stomach tried to warp-jump out, and suddenly Prompto realized this was a very _bad_ plan because it would be the two of them. Alone. In the dark. And Gladio making those little grunt noises as he carried the camping gear. _Those_ noises. The ones that put thoughts in his head that were _not good_ when you were gonna be sharing a tent with a guy. 

... _Great_.

“You’re making a strange face, Chocobo butt,” Gladio said, raising an eyebrow. “Something wrong?”

“Nope, nothing! Just wishing for a nice hotel and a shower. Kinda smell like fish guts,” he said, and hoped the grin he plastered on his face was normal.

Just then, he heard Noct let out a frustrated sigh and reel his line back in. Then immediately recast.

Gladio groaned and flopped down on the ground next to Prompto, rolling onto his back. “We’re gonna be here for a while.”

Prompto buried his face in his hands because both a) Gladio was right and b) it was a lot safer than looking at Gladio sprawled out on his back beside him. 

He couldn’t help but take a quick peek through his fingers, just in time to see Gladio stretch, and...

 _Fuck_ , he was toast.


	7. Polite Fictions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope y’all like exposition! ^^;;

The thing about camping with people was that sometimes, you saw _way_ too much of them.

Weirdly enough, that was a good thing. There were times when Prompto still couldn’t help but feel completely in over his head and outclassed, and like he didn’t deserve to be where he was. But camping helped. Because it was one thing to see His Royal Majesty, Crown Prince - now KING - Noctis Lucis Caelum CXIV, claiming his birthright by claiming the royal arms and summoning actual fucking _gods_.

It was entirely another to see _Noct_ sprawled out on his stomach, his face smushed against a pillow with his mouth open and fast asleep in a puddle of his own drool. He was really hard to put _that_ on a pedestal. King Noctis Lucis Caelum CXIV, intimidatingly way out of his league. But _Noct_? Definitely not on a pedestal.

The other thing that knocked someone right off any “These Beings Are Out of My Plebeian League” pedestal was when someone had morning wood.

The polite fiction with camping and morning wood was that it didn’t happen and you ignored it when it did, and they all _clung_ to that. You didn’t say _anything_ or act any different when someone had it, because you didn’t want anyone saying anything or do anything when _you_ did.

That didn’t mean you didn’t _notice_.

Prompto still remembered the first time he woke up and saw _Ignis_ of all people pitching a tent of his own, and.... Ignis was asleep, primly sleeping on his back, with his glasses tucked away in their case next to his head, and....

Prompto hadn’t known until that moment that it was possible for your brain to just completely _reject_ what it was seeing. Because it did that. His brain short circuited and utterly _rejected_ it. Prim, proper, _posh_ Ignis just wasn’t supposed to...he...no, nope, _no_.

His brain couldn’t handle it, and if it were possible for one’s brain to start crying, his _did_ that morning.

But...as much as his brain noped right on out, it...humanized Ignis. Suddenly, super proper stuffy Ignis, Retainer to the Crown was...a normal guy. Prompto still wanted to desperately scrub that morning from his memory, but...yeah. Ignis was just a _guy_. A guy who got morning wood just like he did. It was hard to be as intimidated by him after that.

So camping, as much as Prompto definitely preferred a nice, warm, soft bed with enough room to stretch out, really helped him because he got to see Gladiolus, Ignis, and Noctis as _people_. People who were just like everyone else when it came right down to the day to day.

But then there are times when it was _bad_.

Like right now.

Normally, Prompto turned in first, because as much as people thought he had boundless energy, the truth was, he only had _so much_ energy, and once he burned through it, it was lights out time. He was also somewhat of a light sleeper - he was better at sleeping through the others getting into the tent now - so he normally slept on one of the ends if he went to bed first so no one had to try and get around him, or in the middle on one of the rare instances when Gladio went to sleep before him or if there were a lot of daemons and monsters around, in which case Gladio would insist on taking the outermost, least protected by the wards position.

They’d figured out the tent sleeping logistics pretty quickly, because the thing about a tent was, it was small.

It was _really_ small.

There was just no way around a few things, logistics wise.

When they first started camping out, Gladio, being the King’s Shield, had insisted that Noct sleep in the “safest” place - in the middle, with Ignis and Gladio on either side of him.

That had lasted all of _two days_. Because while the middle was the safest place, it also meant that everyone who woke up before Noct was stepping over him and jostling him. Which meant...everyone. Prompto had woken up first and literally had to crawl over Ignis and Noct to get out of the tent. And he’d had to get out of the tent because he’d _really_ had to pee. And then he was trying avoid waking Ignis up and was being careful and he ended up instead losing his balance and crashing onto Noct.

Noct had put his foot down the next night camping. “I’m not sleeping in the middle. No. None of you morning people are stepping on me again.”

So the second arrangement had been the Noct sleep in the second safest position that wouldn’t end with him strangling someone for waking him up as soon as the sun rose. Noct would sleep on the outside, in the position closest to the inside of the camp, which would be the most warded, and Gladio would sleep next to him.

That also only lasted one day.

“Gladio, I love you man, but you are too damn big and there is no fucking room. I was squished against the side of the tent the whole night. Next time we camp, switch places with Ignis or Prompto,” he’d grumbled the next morning. 

It had taken a while, but eventually, they had more or less settled on who was sleeping where. The system had worked well, right up until Prompto had to go and get a crush.

A week ago, Prompto waking up the way he had wouldn’t have done anything but make him laugh. But now? Now when he was nursing a stupid, stupid crush he couldn’t stomp on because he knew it wouldn’t end well? Now that he was _noticing_ Gladio and the little _sounds_ he made and the little _looks_ he gave and none of that was not helping him or the crush situation one little bit?

Yeah, waking up to find his back against the side of the tent and his nose pressed up right against Gladio’s chest definitely _wasn’t_ helping.

It had been too hot and humid for sleeping in the sleeping bags (or so everyone but Ignis had decided, because of course Ignis would still sleep prim and proper in his sleeping bag), and Gladio must’ve turned in his sleep, and he was _big_ , so in his sleep he’d tried to get more room, Prompto guessed, and since Prompto had been sleeping on his side, that made space, and so...

His brain started panicking and trying to think of how to get out of where he was, especially since, yup, it was _his_ turn for the awkward morning wood you hoped no one would notice. 

...dammit, why did Gladio have to smell kinda _nice_? All woodsy like and not at all like fish guts. And this close, those tattoos were really...and his chest was really smooth, and...

The morning wood was now risking turning into something _else_ , a whole _other_ kinda wood, and a voice in his head started screaming a panicked, “ _Shit shit shit_!” and he could feel his face starting to turn red.

Gladio let out a sleepy little sound, a contented-sounding little grumbly-grunt-sigh thing, and _shit shit shit, not helping_!

Trying to crawl or slither past or over Gladio would... _really_ not work.

Gladio shifted slightly in his sleep, doing this little back stretchy type thing as he moved and _shit shit shit_.

 _Toast_ , he was _toast_ , all he needed to be was buttered up and... _shit shit shit THAT DIDN’T HELP_.

The little voice panicking in his head started panicking harder.

He took a deep breath and tried to calm down and think about anything BUT Gladio being _that close_ to him.

He shut his eyes and started thinking about anything else. Like fish guts. Yeah, those fish guts. They’d been really gross and stinky and...

...and Gladio shifted in his sleep and now there was an _arm_ on him.

He opened his eyes, and yeah, _mistake_.

It was time to end this before he embarrassed himself and made a mess of...everything. Himself, Gladio, their _friendship_...

If he ended it now, it would be the polite fiction of morning wood that would be _ignored_.

He poked Gladio. And poked him again. Harder. Then one more time, and started shaking him when that didn’t work.

Gladio let out a startled grunt and his eyes blinked open.

“Yeah...sorry about that, Big Guy, but...you’re kinda crushing me here,” he said, praying to any and all gods that might be listening that he sounded _normal_.

“Huh? Oh. OH! Shit, sorry!” Gladio said, blinking sleepily at first and then realizing what was going on. He quickly pulled his arm off of Prompto, and another little voice in his head, the voice that was _not_ his common sense, started booing.

“Thanks, man,” Prompto said, gave him a grin, and _fled_.

**Author's Note:**

> I finally finished the game, but I haven’t played any of the DLC yet, so if you spoil me, I will cut you. :D


End file.
